Imbalance

Perhaps, if you’ve read the two recent postings on this blog, you’ve wondered why I seem to be examining my life so minutely. The answer I think lies in the major back surgery I underwent in mid-March. During my time in the hospital rehab unit, I had an Easter experience.

For four days I was unable to eat anything. The nurses encouraged me to at least eat applesauce, but I simply couldn’t swallow. The fifth day—a Monday—went awry. My blood pressure fluctuated disturbingly. I fainted and was out for some time. I could answer only “Anna Dolores Ready” to all the questions the nurses asked while trying to revive me. Repeatedly I vomited. My spirits plummeted, imprisoned in a gray cloud. I dwelt in a miasma of nothingness.

In late afternoon, my eldest niece visited after work. Seeing me pitch forward and nearly fall, then faint, then throw up, she stayed several hours. She asked the nurse to monitor me closely during the night; the nurse assured her I would be well taken care of.

Needing to feed her cat and dogs, my niece kissed my left cheek and reluctantly left. As she passed through the doorway, I thought, “I’ll never see her again.”

The nurse turned off the light. I lay on my right side and began to talk inwardly to all those who had already entered Life beyond the reality I knew—all those who had raised me, taught me, befriended me. They and I dwelt in Oneness.

Trusting their infinite love for me, I said something like “I’m scared that I’m going to die. If living is for my good and the good of the Universe, then I trust you will wake me in the morning. If not, then I embrace death. Not my will, but the will of Oneness be done.”

I began reciting names: Mom, Dad, Jan, John, Jim . . . name after name after name of those who have touched my life with goodness.

Several times during the night I woke, still feeling lost within myself, still praying to Oneness to keep me in this life or to welcome me to the path of Light. More names: Florence, Al, Mary, Annette, Nicole, Mary Alice.

I slept again. When next I woke, I thought of all the cats who'd blessed my life: Dulcy, Bartleby, Tybalt, Noah, Jeremiah, Eliza Doolittle, Laz, Raissa. I called on each to be with me.

Once more I slept, then woke again and invoked name after name after name of those for whom I felt deep and abiding gratitude. The names passed like ticker-tape through my heart: Miriam, Robert, Andrew, Lon, Scholastica, Dunstan.

The next morning, I awoke to sunlight. I was alive.

Two days later I came home.

Now what does this have to do with the introspection evident in this posting and the last two?

Since that March morning, I’ve found myself feeling not only physically, but emotionally, imbalanced. The doctor tells me that this is a common response of patients who have serious spinal surgery or whose chest has been cracked open for open-heart surgery. I, myself, think that the possibility of saying good-bye to life as we know it can accompany any major surgery. 

I am alive, yet I find myself reevaluating my whole life.

Perhaps the anesthesia has something to do with this. Perhaps my age. Perhaps the weariness resulting from the months of pain before the operation. Perhaps all of that.

And perhaps what I’m experiencing is the opportunity to truly let go of the past and embrace something new in my life. Time will tell.

Peace.

So Much for Which to Be Grateful

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you who have found your way to my blog this November morning. May your day be filled with overflowing gratitude for the wonders of our world and the humanity that inhabits it.

         Here's a video from YouTube in which the narrator sums up the gifts we have been given so abundantly. I hope it speaks to you as gently as it spoke to me.

 Just a reminder: Tomorrow—Black Friday—I’m thanking the Universe for the great abundance in my life by giving away free downloads of the Amazon e-books A Cat’s Life: Dulcy’s Story and A Cat’s Legacy: Dulcy’s Story (which was originally entitled Twelve Habits of Highly Successful Cats and Their Humans). Just come back to my blog tomorrow and click on the words beneath the pictures of the two covers on the right-hand side of the page. That will take you directly to the two e-books on Amazon.

         I’ll post this notification again tomorrow. Please let your feline-loving and animal-loving friends know about this gift from Dulcy and me. Peace.

Postscript: If you want to read a funny story about food and not being grateful for it, please read my posting for yesterday about white sauce! 

Twelve Habits of Highly Successful Cats and Their Humans

Last Saturday’s posting announced a companion book to A Cat’s Life: Dulcy’s Story, which I’ve been promoting on this blog since December 8 of last year. The first book gave birth to the second. How? Through the wisdom of an editor.

            Way back in April 1991, this prospective editor for A Cat’s Life wrote me she’d be interested in the manuscript but only if I deleted half of the 42,000 words. I did and Crown subsequently published Dulcy’s first book in September 1992.

Drawing by Judy J. King from A Cat’s Life: Dulcy’s Story.

            The remaining words have languished on the computer since that time. I tried to breathe life into them three times, but that same editor found them wanting. Years passed and the editor left Crown before I finally hit upon an idea that worked for me. However, it didn’t work for any editors or agents I queried. None of them even asked to see the manuscript.

            Ultimately, I titled the manuscript Twelve Habits of Highly Successful Cats and Their Humans by Dulcy and Dee Ready and decided to publish through Wayman, a new press that offered publication. In her second book, Dulcy suggests to fellow cats twelve habits that can make their lives with humans and with one another the nirvana they longed for. Following each habit is a short reflection I’ve written to show how Dulcy’s habit has influenced my life. Twelve habits; twelve stories purred by Dulcy; twelve reflections mulled by me.

            Today, I’d like to give you a sample of Dulcy’s writing and also of mine. She titles her eighth habit “Accept the Inevitable.” To illustrate her contention that a great gulf exists between the inevitable and the merely intolerable, she inserted a poem detailing her response to my attempt to convert the two cats with whom I lived to vegetarianism.

            Dulcy rebelled. Becoming a feline vegetarian was not inevitable, only intolerable. She purred her disgruntlement in the following poem:

Where is my food?

My giblets with gravy?

My liver with sauce?

My tuna with oil?

My beef with its broth?

I won’t taste these pellets.

These are not good hors d’oeuvres—

not toothsome

not tasty

not luscious

not pleasing—

To one whose fine palate

Knows real haute cuisine.

So give me my food,

My gravy, my beef.

I won’t eat these nuggets.

I won’t stoop to bawl,

But give me delectables,

Or give nothing at all.

Dulcy incorporats this poem into her text for the habit. I follow her text with my own. Here’s my take on Habit 8.

How can we recognize the inevitable as opposed to the intolerable? Dulcy seems so sure of the difference. She saw Bartleby and the love I felt for him as inevitable. But when I brought a third cat into our household, she found this intolerable and disappeared into the pantry for an entire year. Daily she crouched on a shelf there. She left it only to go outside.

For one year she did not talk to me or lie on my lap or lick my fingers. Her message was clear: “Living with Tybalt is intolerable.” And so I gave him to a farmer who later called and said that Tyb was a great mouser.

I have not always been so sure of the difference between inevitable and intolerable. Twice I almost had a nervous breakdown because I accepted as inevitable the conditions under which I was living and working.

But when I let silence surround me and listened to the stirrings of my heart, to the instinct I had for survival, I realized that staying in these situations was not inevitable. The work was merely intolerable. I could leave; I could change the furniture of my life.

What is inevitable? What must happen? Children growing up? Yes. Our bodies slowing down? Yes. Aging? Yes. Death? Yes. Time takes its toll on bodies. They break down, rust out, die. All that is inevitable. And perhaps one other thing is inevitable—love, freely given, abounds in possibilities.

Love can have all the life-giving force of a rain shower. It can help us grow and blossom into all we were meant to be. It can help us flower. The result of a love that is given freely and unconditionally is growth in the spirit.

That growth is inevitable. As the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins says, “It will flame out, like shining from shook foil.” Dulcy believes that the great god of cats calls us to fields of love. That, too, is inevitable.

There you have it—a sample from Dulcy’s companion book Twelve Habits of Highly Successful Cats and Their Humans and a sample also of Dulcy’s wit with regard to her life experience and the philosophy flowing from my own.

Purr and peace to you.

A Cat's Life: Dulcy's Story

In a posting last June, I described my relationship to a cat who, when we first met, gifted me with her name. She was Dulcy, the sweet one. After her death, she purred the story of our life together in a book channeled through me.

        A later December posting detailed how I came to have 670 trade paperback copies of that book—A Cat’s Life: Dulcy’s Story. At that time, readers could purchase it through PayPal. Now Amazon sells it, as well as the e-book edition. All this gladdens me.

        Why recall this to you today? Because next Tuesday, a second book Dulcy created will become available. It is entitled Twelve Habits of Highly Successful Cats and Their Humans by Dulcy and Dee Ready. In my next posting, I'll explain how this companion book came to be. Today, I’d like to share with you the story of how I realized that I needed Dulcy in my life.

        I’ve already related the story of my return to Dayton in 1971 upon the completion of grad school. I could find no work because of having an FBI file. However, a warehouse manager hired me. Unfortunately, the warehouse sat outside the city limits, and without a car, I had no way to get there. Luckily for me, a fellow employee offered to pick me up at the home of a mutual friend. I’d ride my bike there each weekday morning and hitch a ride.

        One November afternoon, I pedaled happily away from the friend's house, turned left, and traveled a few blocks down a neighborhood street. All was as usual until I heard a car approaching behind me. Slowly, ever so slowly and deliberately, the car edged me closer and closer to the curbing. I kept pedaling, staring ahead, not wanting to look to the left side for fear of eye contact.

        Long moments passed. Pedaling became difficult in the narrow passage between the side of the car and the curb. Unexpectedly, a hand reached out the car window to grab and twist my wrist. It shoved me sideways so that the bike and I tumbled to the ground. My body fell awkwardly, my feet still held captive by the pedal guard.

        As the car sped away, I could see the heads of two men.

        I lay shaking on the grassy verge for a few moments, fearful that they’d come back. Glancing at my aching wrist, I realized that the intrusive hand had twisted off my watch. I’d treasured it for seventeen years because my aunt had given it to me when I graduated from high school. It was now gone, but were the two men?

       Clumsily, I mounted the bike and pedaled furiously toward home. On the way, I sang “I Whistle a Happy Tune” as loudly as I could. 

        

Then, as I’d feared, the car drew alongside me again. The two young men inside greeted me cheerily.

        Ignoring them, I concentrated on pedaling. Finally, perhaps annoyed with my off-key singing, they sped away. I was relieved because I'd feared they’d follow me to where I lived.

        A few days later, the warehouse manager fired me and I got a job teaching at a dropout center. Then in March 1972, a friend, worried because I had no one to go home to for comfort, encouraged me to pick out a kitten from the litter in her upstairs closet. Thus, Dulcy came into my life.

        For the next seventeen and a half years, she became my ally. Not only was she the sweet one. She was solicitous about my welfare, always greeting me with a purr and a rub of my ankles. She became, I say this with deep gratitude, my companion.

   

Nothing Ventured; Nothing Gained

In my December 13 posting I explained that the Crown editor Jane Meara asked me to cut in half the 44,000 words of Dulcy’s manuscript by concentrating on the relationship between the two of us. Immediately I ruthlessly rid the manuscript of superfluous incidents. Of course, being a hoarder of words, I pasted everything I cut into a separate document.

            The being published hoopla ebbed by the spring of 1993. That summer I tried to create another manuscript from the happenings I’d cut. The ideas I tried out left me with a story that had no suspense; no glue holding it together.

            Then I came up with the idea of Dulcy using these deleted stories to teach other felines how to find bliss. The material easily divided itself into twelve instructive lessons for cats. I followed each of these with a reflection for humans.

            Jane Meara, however, turned down the manuscript. “There’s no thread holding it together,” she said. “No drive compelling me to read beyond the first story.” Since then, I’ve tried unsuccessfully to find an agent interested in the manuscript. No go.

            This July, twenty years will have passed since Crown offered me a contract for Dulcy book. During that time, I’ve written three other cats books—one with my sister-in-law—but I’ve been unable to drum up interest in them. So I’m at a standstill.

            Perhaps the thing to do is to make e-books out of them. I’m not sure. Promoting an e-book takes more technical know-how then I have. So this year will see me making a final effort to find an agent to represent my work.

            In these intervening years, I’d done some work for hire. That is, I was paid a fee to write books for which I received no royalty. Capstone, a children’s publishing house in Mankato, Minnesota, hired me to write twenty-four books for primary learners.

            Twelve of the books explain the work of community helpers.

            Four explore the nature of oceans, mountains, rain forests, and deserts. I wrote these books using my first name (Anna) and my mother’s maiden name (O’Mara).

            Eight describe the workings of vehicles like trucks, school buses, and motorcycles.

            In addition, I wrote two books for middle graders on the Revolutionary War: one on the Boston Massacre and one on the Battle of Yorktown.

            Also, in the past twenty years, I’ve completed a novel on first-century Palestine and the first third of a novel on Bronze-Age Greece. Both required months of research, much of which I promptly forgot. Finally, I’ve written a first draft of a novel about four ex-nuns.

            From 1984 to 2001, I earned my living as a freelance editor and curriculum developer and wrote my own manuscripts by setting aside an hour each morning. Since 2001, I’ve taken on one or two freelance projects a year. But as I explained in a December posting, I now want to concentrate solely on my own writing. While writing, I’ll look for an agent to represent my work. I’ve never succeeded with this before but I continue to believe “Nothing ventured; nothing gained.”

            It’s time to start again and to discover if, at the age of 75, I can become the “Grandma Moses” of books. She was 78 when her art was discovered. Perhaps, I, too, might find success in my seventies. If not, then I’ll simply enjoy the craft of placing one word by another and creating a cadence that entices the mind and the heart into the lyrics of a story.

            That is enough. It is more than enough. 

Publishing Then and Now

Crown, a division of New York’s Random House, published Dulcy’s hardcover the last week of September in 1992. A round of signings, readings, newspaper interviews, and television and radio appearances followed. I set these up by using the phone numbers provided by the Crown publicist. Crown promoted the book with a single ad in the magazine Cat Fancy. Dulcy’s book quickly sold almost 14,000 copies, mostly in Minnesota.   

         

A signing at an elementary school in Hastings, Minnesota.

            Here’s how I learned that.

            A former student of mine was accepted in the month-long 1993 professional editing seminar held each summer in Colorado. Prestigious editors and publishers taught the seminar. By chance, this articulate student sat at lunch one afternoon with a vice president of Random House.

            The student explained that the preceding autumn she’d taken a class in which the professor talked about a book she’d gotten published. “Do you remember A Cat’s Life: Dulcy’s Story?” she asked. “And Dee Ready?”

            The woman did. “Dee sold that book,” she explained. “Without her the sales would have been minimal.” She confided that almost all the copies had sold in Minnesota where I lived. “She got out and promoted. I wish all our authors would do that.”

            The vice president then explained that publishers promoted bestselling authors who didn’t need promotion but expected it. “The small book gets lost,” she added.

            According to this vice president, no one at Crown thought Dulcy’s book had much of a chance but the editor—Jane Meara—believed in it. “If we’d listened to Jane, we’d have put some money behind it and had a bestseller.”

            I learned all this later and spent the whole of a day feeling morose. A friend suggested that the conjunction of the planets just wasn’t right. By then, however, Crown had sold rights to publishers in Germany, Korea, Japan, and China. Dulcy’s book was going to reach across the oceans. With that I was content. Crown had believed in the book enough to get it published elsewhere.           

            For the past twenty years, I’ve chosen to rejoice that her story reached at least 14,000 readers in the United States. And yet I don’t think that would happen today. Here’s why.

            In thinking about Dulcy I hit upon two keys—family member and channeling—to open the doors to interviews and signings. In the late ‘80s and early ‘90s most people didn’t speak of animals as family members. That wasn’t acceptable. So when I called booksellers and journalists, I emphasized that Dulcy and I had become a family and that I’d lost my companion. I also explained that she’d channeled the book through me. These two keys intrigued my listeners. All responded with interest.

            I don’t think those keys would work today. After Dulcy’s book was published a series of other cat books were published. Some were excellent; others, not so much. The cat-book market slumped and editors simply had no interest in new books. Several writers, like Desmond Morris, continued to be published but their books were more about cats or dogs in general.

            Then a book came along that changed the publishing scene and made intimate books about animals important again. In 2005, Marley & Me by John Grogan became a bestseller and then a movie. It helped people everywhere understand the bond between dogs and humans.

            Then, in 2008, came Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World by Vicki Myron. The book’s cover, a photograph of Dewey gazing gently at the reader, captured the attention of cat lovers everywhere.

            Today, people converse easily about their pets being members of the family. In 1992, that concept was intriguing. Today it’s just accepted. Channeling, however, might still work. I’m not sure.

            Another great difference, of course, between now and then is the fewer number of bookstores throughout the United States and also the fact that many, many readers don’t have the discretionary money to purchase books today. For myself, I’d be quite content if every library in the country had a copy of Dulcy’s book that could be checked out again and again by those who love animals.

            Finally, fewer newspapers exist today and many of these spend little space on book reviews. Also, many afternoon talk shows in local television markets have disappeared.

            So you see, the universe is just different from twenty years ago. Today, Dulcy’s book might not even be published. And yet. And yet. I continue to believe that she has the power to touch many lives.

Entering the World of Promotion

For ten years—between 1984 and 1994—I taught professional editing to adult night classes at the University of Minnesota. Each quarter we built a community together. In the autumn of 1992, one student was a friend who encouraged me to tell the others about the publication of Dulcy’s book. I hesitated as I tried to keep my personal life out of the classroom.

The U of M classroom where I taught professional editing for ten years.

            The class of twenty-five had met several times when she stood up one evening and announced, “I just wanted all of you to know that Dee has had a book published and she’s doing signings and readings in the Twin Cities.”

            What a buzz and a to-do.

            All the students were excited for me and wanted to know how I got published and all the rigmarole I’ve been sharing with you. Their excitement ignited mine. So every week after that I’d begin the class with a ten-minute summary of the latest news about A Cat’s Life: Dulcy’s Story. I’d recount what happened at the most recent signings and list for them the ones coming up.

            Many of these enthusiastic Dulcy followers came to signings that were close to where they lived in the Twin Cities or the suburbs. Years later I was still running into these students at restaurants and malls. They’d gleefully recall the early winter of 1992. They’d so enjoyed “being in the know” about the publishing process.

Three students at one of the signings.

            These signings and readings took place at both chain and independent bookstores. Between October and April 1993, I entered a new world of publicity. None of it daunted me. I was doing this for Dulcy. She’d given me the gift of her book. Now I was giving her the gift of promoting it.

            Television and newspaper reporters interviewed me in Stillwater, the Twin Cities, Seattle where I visited at Thanksgiving, and Kansas City when I visited for Christmas. One well-known television personality in Minneapolis interviewed me at my dining room table. The newspaper reporters had me come to their offices and interviewed me there.

            I hadn’t worn makeup for many years. However, the television staff of the news and talk shows insisted I’d look “washed-out” without at least lipstick. Remember the friend who’d chanted, “Bor-ing! Bor-ing! Bor-ing!” when I asked for an opinion of the manuscript back in early 1990? She offered to go with me to the television stations and help with the makeup. I felt as awkward in applying lipstick as I had when I’d left the convent twenty-six years before.

            Reading for twenty minutes for Minnesota Public Radio was a fascinating experience. Daily, I listened to MPR’s “All Things Considered.” That program and its ebullient reporters informed my life. Now here I was, sitting in a sound studio and listening to my own voice recount the days of my life with Dulcy.

            The Arts Program on MPR taped my reading. It would be part of their offerings the next day. Glancing up from Dulcy’s book, I could see the program’s moderator beyond the plate-glass window. Within that studio, I felt Dulcy’s presence all around me. Our life together was touching many others. One more gift among the many she’d already given me.

            The next evening, at a signing in St. Paul, a man approached the table where I sat signing Dulcy’s book. He handed me a copy he’d just purchased. While I signed it for him, he told me how much he’d enjoyed listening to me read on MPR. The story I’d chosen to read had captured his attention while he ate his Reuben.

The same signing during the late autumn of 1992.

            A cat lover himself, he thanked me for sharing Dulcy’s story. Meeting people like him and hearing his and their pet stories made these signings and readings a true delight for me.

            In my next posting I’ll share with you the reason that all this happened back in 1992. I don’t think Dulcy’s book would be met in the same way today. You’ll see what I mean on Saturday.

                                                            (Continued on Saturday . . . )

PS: Health news: The infection persists. I started my third round of antibiotics yesterday. Mostly I’m feeling exhausted and so I’m napping, reading, and staring into space!